Short summary of game mechanics?

[SirMaoh]

Hi everyone :)

At the moment I'm full into Guilty Gear Xrd 2rev, but I've been on the fence for BB for quiet a while too. Could someone give me a small summary of all major game mechanics? A comparison to GG would be even better, maybe something like this? :)

BB GG
double jump yes yes
air blocking no yes
escape combos ... yes

Edit: is the netcode as good as the one from GG?

[Calamitus]

Maybe this[docs.google.com] can help you

As for netcode, i don't think it's any different from GG.

[Kyuzo]

They share many mechanics. Double jump, blocking, escaping combos...
The important few diferences I remember are:

- Button layout:

In GG you have: Punch, Kick, Slash, Heavy Slash and Dust.
In BB you have: A, B, C and D. A, B and C are weak, medium and hard attacks, and D is the Drive, which is the special ability of the character.

In BlazBlue, you don't have any Dust attack. Also, to throw the enemy, you must press A+B, instead of 4H or 6H.

- Special attacks and instakills:

In BlazBlue, they work in a similar manner.
With 50% of the gauge (there are a few exceptions, but this is the general rule), you can make a special attack (Distortion Drive), and with 100%, you can make the Astral Drive (the instakill). In BB you can make the Astral Drive anytime as long as you have filled the gauge, you have won one round AND the enemy has less than 30% of their life.

- Overdrive/Burst:

In BB, pressing A+B+C+D has two different effects depending on the moment you press these buttons. If you are being attacked, you will make a Burst, which throws back your enemy. This is similar to GG's Burst.
However, if you press them while not being attacked, you will enter in the Overdrive status, which makes your atacks stronger and has some other effects depending on the character you are controlling.
After using the Burst or the Overdrive, you must wait before making another Burst or Overdrive.

- Clash and counters:

In BB, there is not Clash mechanic but you have the counter mechanic, which basically means attacking while your opponent is going to attack or is recovering from an attack.
Counter hits may alter the physics of your attacks and may allow you to intiate combos which could not be done under common circumstances.

- Fighting pace:

In my experience, BB revolves around combos more than GG does. However, this is a personal opinion and I am not quite skilled in fighting games, so don't trust me too much.

[Meseki]

Air blocking is possible in BlazBlue, it's just that most ground attacks must be Barrier Blocked in the air (back+A+B). Also, along with using a Burst while being hit, while guarding you can use 50% meter to do a Counter Assault (this game's version of a Dead Angle Attack) or you can use Overdrive (which has invincible activation) to try to get out of pressure.

[Xonot]

You can air block in Blazblue though, you just have to use Barrier on some of the moves.

Combos tend to be more universal than Guilty Gear but they also tend to be a lot longer. Wake up in Blazblue is a lot more forgiving than Guilty Gear depending on the match up so you won't run into Milia levels of grinder. That said, some characters have really dirty mixups like instant overheads, unblockable setups, etc. Pressure will be a lot longer since Blazblue's pressure tools can be really strong. It helps that the playerbase is a good mix of casuals and serious players so you have a wide skill range to learn from (even if the player count is smaller)

You still have a lot of similarites to Guilty Gear though:
Barrier is functionally the same as Faultless Defense
Both games have Burst
Rapid is the same as Red Roman Cancels (but no slowdown)
Counter Assault is identical to Dead Angle
You can still tech in the air
Gatling system (light > med > heavy > special > super)
Negative Penalty exists in both games but in this one, you enter Danger State rather than losing all your meter.
Combos still follow the pattern of having routes based on enemy state (crouch/stand, counter/normal, etc.)

etc.

Some differences:
No jump install for most of the cast. I'm not even sure if any character has one.
You cannot airdash after certain situations like air teching
Grabs are not frame 1 like in Guilty Gear and the tech window is pretty generous.
You can grab people in hitstun or blockstun. This is a purple grab but has a massive tech window, making it an unsafe reset option
You do not gain meter for moving toward the opponent. You don't lose it by walking back either
You only have Red Roman Cancels in the form of Rapid. There is no YRC or PRC options
No Danger Time (lol)
Burst can be used for Overdrive, a temporary power boost that lets you use the Exceed Accel super for it's duration
Barrier is not bound to meter. It has it's own meter which will put you into Danger State if totally depleted.
In addition to regular counters, some moves have a Fatal Counter property which lets you get even more potential damage.
There is no Blitz Shield.


I recommend reading the sticky post on the Blazblue subreddit. The discord chat linked there will also have lots of helpful information.

[SirMaoh]

wow, thanks for all the quick feedback! :)

So, to summarize all of this, both games roughly got the same mechanics. The biggest differences seem to be:

- smaller sprites
- 4 buttons instead of 5
- longer / more difficult combos
- street fighter like grabbing / throws

I'm pretty bad at doing long combos (maintaining the rythm), espicially mid-air. Would BB be a worse choice for me compared to GG then? I'm mainly playing Ramlethal because I like her simple combos. Are there any similiar characters/movesets in BB?

[Kyuzo]

You don't necessarily have to play mid-air combos. There are easy characters, like Ragna. You can try with him. If you still hesitate about playing this saga, I would recommend you to try Continuum Shift Extend. Since this instalment, you can access some tutorials which teach you general mechanics and many combos for every character (it also has the story of Calamity Trigger, so you will not get lost in the story, if you are interested in it).

[HighLanderPony]

Feels like you'd need lube more than anything else. Game's tough as heck.